


Whole

by Cozy_The_Overlord



Category: Loki - Fandom, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Asgard (Marvel), Childhood Friends, Childhood Friends to Lovers, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, Hurt Loki (Marvel), I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, Loki (Marvel) Feels, Loki (Marvel) Needs a Hug, Post-Thor (2011)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-14
Updated: 2021-02-14
Packaged: 2021-03-15 16:14:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,803
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29438832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cozy_The_Overlord/pseuds/Cozy_The_Overlord
Summary: After surviving years of torture at the hands of the Mad Titan Thanos, a broken, weary Loki returns home to find his childhood sweetheart has moved on with another man.
Relationships: Loki (Marvel)/OFC, Loki (Marvel)/Original Female Character(s), Loki (Marvel)/Reader
Comments: 10
Kudos: 48





	Whole

**Author's Note:**

> I swear I didn't plan this. I had a nice, fluffy, lovely, sweet little fic planned out for Valentine's Day. I outlined it, I started writing it ... and then I turned around and wrote this angst fest. I feel kind of guilty about it-- I swore I'd let up on the angst for a bit after Now, Forever, and Always, but I got inspired and decided to run with it. I promise the fluffy fic is coming, although I can't say when.
> 
> Anyways, hope you all have a lovely Valentine's Day, and thank you so much for reading.

He found her in the gardens.

Runa was sitting on a bench across from the lake, the silver skirt of her dress trickling around her legs in the breeze. She cradled an infant in her arms as she chatted with the woman besides her.

Loki watched her, hidden away behind the tree line, the illusion of another face masking his own. He had heard about the baby. They had told him back on the Sanctuary, after they had dug through his memories and ripped her from his mind.

_Poor princeling. Have you not heard? Runa Birkirdottir is married and with child. She cares not for you._

Loki hadn’t known whether to believe them. They had told him many things there—his home was gone, his mother was dead, his father was seeking his life in retribution. Once, he could’ve discerned what was truth and what was falsehood as easily as he breathed, his time with the Mad Titan had turned his instincts to syrup. He had found himself crumbling with the weight of their words, even as he fought to ignore them.

The Children of Thanos had lied about many things. But in this instance, it seemed they had spoken the truth.

The baby had started to cry, shrill little squalls that Loki could hear even from where he stood. Runa rocked it gently against her shoulder, murmuring under her breath. Soon the infant stilled, and the conversation continued.

Motherhood suited her, he realized. It was a strange realization. Never had he thought the devious girl he had met sneaking through the catacombs beneath the palace would melt into such a matronly role, but she glowed with the same fire that had always burned within her as she lulled her child to sleep.

He had always been entranced by that fire. From the moment they had run into each other, deep within the hidden passageways they both knew they weren’t allowed to explore, he hadn’t been able to take his eyes off of her.

Loki had thought he had been alone down there—as far as he was aware, he had been the only one in all of Asgard who even _knew_ of those concealed tunnels. When he turned the corner and nearly collided with a girl from his lessons, he couldn’t hold in his gasp of surprise.

Runa hadn’t even skipped a beat. “I won’t tell on you if you don’t tell on me” she hissed before scuttling down the corridor, hiking her skirt up above her knees. With a bewildered nod, Loki had found himself following her.

They had both come down there to hide, but her motive was much more impressive than his quiet desire for escape. He remembered how she had smirked as she showed him a sword with a gleaming handle, smothered in a leather sheath.

“My brother says girls aren’t strong enough to carry swords,” she whispered. “Apparently boys aren’t smart enough to guard them.”

Loki snickered despite himself. He knew of her brother—a tall, stiff thing who accompanied Thor and his friends on their various adventures. Loki couldn’t say he particularly cared for him.

“Does he know you took it?” he asked.

“Nope.” She was grinning ear to ear. “I’ll bet he’s tearing his bedroom apart looking for it like the bear he is. Father said he wouldn’t let him go to sparring practice for a _month_ if anything happened to it.” Runa sighed, cradling the sheath like a doll. “I’m going to keep it hidden here forever—he’ll never find it.”

“Wait—I have a better idea,” Loki whispered excitedly. He had pulled this trick on Thor earlier, and it had worked like a charm. “What you should do is keep it here until he realizes he didn’t lose it, but that someone has actually taken it. Then, when he goes to tell your father it’s been stolen, put it back in his room, somewhere really obvious. He’ll look like a complete buffoon for not seeing it.”

Her eyes lit up. Even then, Loki thought there was something magical about the way she smiled.

His mother joked that the whole of Asgard braced itself the day Loki Odinson and Runa Birkirdottir became friends. Runa was already beginning to be known as headstrong and argumentative, the type of student who would interrupt a lesson to point out the instructor’s mistakes with a self-satisfied smirk, and Loki had long since been labeled as a problem by every adult who had ever interacted with him. The two of them together … it was a beautiful nightmare.

In their defense, most of the hijinks they got into were fairly benign. They stole things from their brother’s rooms and placed bets on how long it would take them to notice. They snuck into locked classrooms and switched out the textbooks with the pamphlets they found under Runa’s brother’s bed, the ones with the vulgar illustrations that she claimed would send her mother into shock if she knew they were there. One time, she got him to transform the figurines on the desk of their tedious government instructor into live cockroaches. The monotony of the classroom was shattered as the creatures scuttled every which way, students screaming, running, climbing on chairs or frantically attempting to squash them. Across the room and through the chaos, Loki caught Runa’s gaze, mirth bubbling in her shining eyes. He was quite certain he was grinning like a fool.

She never had his gift for magic, but she seemed to understand it better than some other seidr-wielders he had met. There were times as they grew where it seemed they almost shared one mind. She somehow always knew what he was struggling with and what steps to take to fix it. She knew how to help him focus when he was distracted. She could see through his illusions.

That used to frustrate him. Surely he had to be doing something wrong then, if it was so easy for her to brush them aside. He used to practice in his room for hours, honing his skills until he could create illusions realistic enough to fool his own mother, but when he’d walk by her in the hallway wearing another’s face, Runa would stop and laugh.

“I know it’s you, Loki!” she chortled, grabbing his wrist and pulling him forward. “Can’t fool me!” The image shattered at her touch.

Loki glared at her. “You are the most infuriating woman on this planet.”

“I know.” Runa grinned, hooking her arm in his as they continued on together. “That’s why you like me.”

She was as fierce as she was infuriating. Asgardian tradition barred women from practicing the art of war alongside their male counterparts, but Runa had not been deterred. When Loki first ran into her beneath the palace, she had already become quite handy with a sword—the result of hours of mimicking her brother’s fencing lessons alone in her apartment with a fire iron. She had been fascinated by Loki’s daggers.

“I wish I had something like these,” Runa mused, turning the blade in the light. After a moment’s thought, she held it to her hip. “I could hide them under my skirt, and no one would know the difference!” She began bunching up the fabric of her dress, as if to attempt such a thing at once, and Loki ripped his gaze away with burning cheeks.

She wasn’t the woman who felt Asgard’s status quo was lacking. Pressure for a more equal environment had been building throughout their youth, and by the time they had come of age Odin had succumbed to the demands and opened Einherjar training to the fairer sex. Runa had been the first to apply.

Loki remembered the first time he had seen her in her armor, her sword hanging in its ramshackle sheath at her waist, strolling up to the training grounds as if she was the instructor rather than another faceless student. He had been waiting in frustration for his brother to finish lacing up his boots so they could spar, but he lost his impatient scowl when she walked by. She exuded such … _confidence_ in her stride, such carefree _power_ , it was impossible to take his eyes off her. Loki hadn’t even noticed Thor standing besides him until he smacked him on the back.

“Close your mouth,” he said. “You’re drooling.”

They had their first kiss on those training grounds. It had been a summer night, the date of some grand feast Loki couldn’t quite remember. He hated feasts. They were all the same—loud and stuffy and obnoxious, the kind of noise that seeped into his bones and throttled him from within. When Runa sidled up to him with the offhand suggestion that they sneak out to the gardens, he had jumped at the idea.

They had ended up on the sparring grounds. Runa had almost immediately hitched up her skirts and challenged him to a fight. It had been somewhat facetious, and looking at her in her voluminous gown, scowling through her makeup, Loki couldn’t hold back his laughter.

She glowered. “You see something funny, Odinson?”

“Of course not,” he chuckled. Perhaps he had had a bit too much wine at the feast—he felt rather lightheaded. Still, the feeling seemed almost freeing. “I’m looking upon the fiercest warrior in all of Asgard!” he teased.

“And don’t you forget it!” Loki barely had time to react before she had tackled him to the ground with a ferocious battle cry. He fought back with a giddy giggle, wrestling for control as she tried to hold him down. It must have been quite a sight, the two of them rolling around in the dirt in their fancy dinner clothes. His mother would’ve had a fit if she could see them. In the end, Runa had him pinned, although in Loki’s defense he hadn’t truly been trying. Holding his wrists above his head, she leaned towards him until their noses were nearly touching.

“Well,” she whispered after several moments of silence had passed, the scent of wine sweet on her breath. “Are you going to kiss me or not?”

Loki let out a hoarse laugh. “Must I kiss you?” he asked. “Why can’t you kiss me?”

She rolled her eyes. “I have to do everything around here.”

“If it’s such a chore for you, my lady, then I’m not certain—” Runa planted her lips on his before he could finish. All at once, he couldn’t remember what exactly he had been saying.

When she pulled away, they were both breathless, her eyes holding a million sparkling stars and a galaxy of questions.

“Still uncertain?” she breathed. Loki pulled his wrist loose from her grasp without much effort, reaching to cup her cheek with her hand.

“Never,” he whispered against her lips.

No one was surprised when they got engaged.

“Took you long enough,” Thor muttered, not even looking up from the sword he was polishing when Loki came to tell him the news. “It was about time the two of you stopped pretending to be subtle.” Even Odin’s attempts to persuade him into a more advantageous match were half-hearted.

Loki and Runa were meant for each other, and everyone knew it.

They were _meant_ for each other.

Loki watched her from his hiding spot, cradling the child that should’ve been his. There was a numbness in his chest that he had become quite familiar with these past few years, the empty ache that took the place of pain once his body could take no more.

Why had he come back? What had he expected to find here? Runa waiting patiently for him at the edge of the sparring grounds, hands folded and unchanged since he last saw her?

He couldn’t remember the last thing he said to her. That had to be the worst part of all, because he knew it couldn’t have been good. Runa had accompanied them to Jotunheim that fateful day. She had been the only one to take note of his distress upon their return, a distress that went beyond Thor’s banishment. Loki remembered that she had asked after him, and that in his fright he had snapped at her. His memories were far less tangible after that. Clammy hands grasping eternal frost. His father choking under the weight of his own lies. Gungnir’s burden in his fist, his mother’s words ringing in his ears.

Runa sobbing his name.

And then there was nothing, nothing but the weightless fall, the swirling abyss that ripped him apart over and over again until it seemed that there could be nothing of him left, until the sound of his own screams was broken by a slithering voice thrust into his mind …

_Hear me and rejoice!_

Did they tell Runa what he was, he wondered, after they had given him up for dead? Did they tell her what kind of monster she had almost irrevocably tied herself to? Perhaps she had been relieved to have been spared such a fate. Loki knew he would have been.

He had clung to her memory on the Sanctuary, clung to the mischievous girl under the palace, the sparkling goddess under the stars, the breathtaking woman who had always been there besides him even when he felt no one else was. Until they found her and tore her from his head along with everything else he held dear.

Runa’s conversation with her friend seemed to be reaching its conclusion. As the other woman made to leave, Loki’s eyes went again to the child. He knew of the father, a minor noble of the court that neither he nor Runa had ever paid much mind. They had been married shortly after Loki’s fall. He imagined it had happened in a rush, with Runa’s family scrambling to save her from his disgrace. A part of him wanted to be angry, but he couldn’t muster the strength. Who could blame them?

She was alone now, alone with her baby. Loki knew he should be leaving as well. What good did it do for him to linger? Runa had moved on with her life. It was time he did so with his.

Even so, he found himself approaching her bench, cloaked in the illusion of a palace guard. He had to talk to her. Even if it wasn’t truly him she was talking to, he had to hear her voice.

The baby was fussing again and Runa was rocking it back and forth, murmuring nonsense in a singsong voice. She didn’t look up as he approached.

Still, he bowed before he could think the better of it. “Good afternoon, my lady.”

Runa gave a nondescript nod. “Good afternoon.”

There was a silver dagger strapped to her hip. The realization brought all sorts of emotions frothing forth in his chest, but Loki swallowed them down.

The baby seemed to have calmed some. It gurgled, grabbing at its mother’s necklace. Runa only laughed as she tucked the chain beneath her dress.

Loki inhaled. “If you don’t mind me saying, my lady, you have a lovely child.”

“Thank you. I’m very proud of him.” She held the infant’s wrist up and mimed a wave. “Say hi, Loki!”

His voice caught in his throat. “Loki?” he choked. Runa nodded, eyes still on the child. It was a moment before he regained the ability to speak. “That’s a … controversial choice.”

“Oh, you don’t know the half of it,” she said, shaking her head. “I thought my mother-in-law was going to murder me in my sleep.” She smiled, turning to him. “But I knew what I wanted, and I can be quite—”

It was then she finally met his eyes. Her mouth dropped open. Recognition bloomed across her face. For a moment, Loki panicked. Had the illusion failed? How? It was the _simplest_ form of magic—

_I know it’s you, Loki. Can’t fool me!_

Of course.

There were tears glistening in the corners of her eyes. Loki’s own eyes burned as he sank to his knees before her, the illusion crashing down to pieces around him. She reached out to stroke his cheek with a hesitancy that suggested she didn’t quite believe he was real. Her fingers were warm—warm and tinged with the sweet sort of familiarity he only ever felt in dreams. He melted into her touch.

Her voice cracked when she spoke. “ _Loki_.”

Words bubbled to his lips: apologies, pleas, vows, none of which he had the strength to utter. This moment was temporary. They both had to know it. Their fates had diverged long ago. They had gone too far down their respective paths to double back. Nothing could change that now.

And yet, just for this moment, it was all right.

Just for this moment, he was whole again.

**Author's Note:**

> Fun fact: when I wrote out the description for this fic, I stopped and said "that sounds too depressing" and started deleting it. And my sister, reading over my shoulder, said "no, keep it. It's accurate."
> 
> If you enjoyed this story, feel free to check out my Tumblr (@cozy-the-overlord)!


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